Social Media Stats Updated

More than two thirds of UK local authorities now have at least one Twitter account (314 councils – 73%) and a similar number have a Facebook account (267 – 67%), according to SOCITM.

Around a third of council websites promote the authority’s use of the video-sharing site YouTube (162 – 37%); the picture-sharing site Flickr (151 – 35%); and some form of blog (130 – 30%). Only four councils (1%) were found to use ‘LinkedIn’, a network most commonly used by individuals to build up trusted business connections.

The councils with the most ‘followers’ on Facebook (including ‘friends’, ‘likes’ and ‘members’) were Coventry (18,182) and West Lothian (15,959), according to the report. The council with the most Twitter followers was Glasgow (9,137), with twice as many as the next nearest, Edinburgh (4,859), and Newcastle upon Tyne (4,487). A significant number of councils are active on multiple social networks: some 59 were found to use four or more.